Labor Pains Jolt Couple Unaware of Pregnancy

A California couple’s train trip to Missoula, Mont., to attend a weekend wedding ended unexpectedly when an episode of cramps believed to be caused by the woman’s anemia resulted in a 5-pound, 12-ounce baby boy.

“My friends aren’t going to believe this,” said Richard Herbert, 24, a marine biology major at Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, Calif. “They aren’t going to believe I’m a father.”

Herbert’s girlfriend, Karen Watson, 20, believed her periods had stopped because of medical problems with anemia and hyperthyroidism. That’s what she thought was causing the cramps that struck her Thursday evening, about 20 minutes south of Albany.

Herbert asked the Amtrak conductor to call ahead for an ambulance.

Paramedics met them at the train station. As they loaded Watson into the ambulance, a medic looked at Watson’s distended stomach and asked how long she had been pregnant.

When Herbert replied that Watson was not pregnant, the medic pulled out a fetal monitor and proclaimed there was a baby.

“I was very shocked,” Herbert said Friday.

The baby was born at 7:09 p.m. Thursday at Albany General Hospital.

Herbert, who watched the birth, said it was like “an out-of-body experience. It was so unexpected, and I was so tired.”

Doctors estimate that Watson was at least 7 1/2 to 9 months pregnant when she gave birth, despite gaining only 7 pounds over her usual weight of 105.